Students Nervously Return to School After Shooting

At the Global Concepts Charter School in Lackawanna, N.Y., near Buffalo, Principal David Ehrle fielded calls from parents who told him they had shielded their children from news coverage over the weekend. The parents wanted to know whether the kids would hear about it from their teachers. He told them they would not.

“Certainly, you can’t stop kids from talking on the bus or at the lunch table, but as a school we’re not, if you will, sponsoring educating about it,” he said.

Ehrle said teachers at the kindergarten through eighth-grade school were told to assure kids who asked that the school was safe and send any apprehensive students to a counselor if necessary.

“Often, normalcy is the most comforting thing for the students,” he said. “That was the message that we sent out over the weekend to the staff is, that we need to continue on doing what we’ve always done.”

Eight-year-old Ally Tobey said she had a completely normal day of third-grade in Concord, N.H. Asked if any of her friends or teachers mentioned Connecticut, she said simply, “nope.”

American history teacher Richard Cantlupe said he would remind his students his No. 1 job was to keep them out of harm’s way and that, “Just like the teachers at Newtown, I would do whatever I had to do to keep them safe.”

Rosell said she didn’t tell her daughter any details about the shooting, but did try to prepare her in case there was ever a dangerous situation in the future. She advised her daughter to dive onto the floor if she ever saw someone with a gun or people screaming.

“You mean like hide under my desk?” she said her daughter asked.

No, Rosell told her, explaining she should pretend to be lifeless on the floor instead and not move until she comes to get her. Her daughter looked at her confused.